Machine translation of chat sessions

ABSTRACT

An embodiment may involve a database containing a first user profile that specifies a first preferred language of a first user and a second user profile that specifies a second preferred language of a second user. The embodiment may also involve one or more processors configured to: receive, from the first user and within a chat session, a first set of messages in the first preferred language; cause the first set of messages to be translated into the second preferred language; provide, to the second user and within the chat session, the first set of messages as translated; receive, from the second user and within the chat session, a second set of messages in the second preferred language; cause the second set of messages to be translated into the first preferred language; and provide, to the first user and within the chat session, the second set of messages as translated.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application is a continuation-in-part of and claims priority toU.S. patent application Ser. No. 16/820,473, filed Mar. 16, 2020, whichis hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety.

BACKGROUND

Enterprises are increasing their global presence, with offices spreadacross different countries and continents. As a result, not allenterprise employees or customers may speak the same languages.Disparate languages become a barrier to operations when two or moreemployees cannot communicate with one another, or when an enterpriseemployee cannot communicate with a customer of the enterprise. Oftenthis attempted communication takes place by way of graphical userinterfaces within information technology tools, these tools includingincident reporting, knowledgebase, or online chat applications.

SUMMARY

The embodiments herein provide graphical user interfaces that facilitatetranslation so that users who do not have any common language fluencycan communicate with one another. In particular, these interfaces allowa user to specify a preferred language, and mechanisms to translateother languages appearing in the interfaces into the preferred language.The translation may involve either replacing the original text with thetranslated text, or positioning the translated text adjacent to ornearby the original text. Further, the user may be able to togglewhether the translated text is highlighted. This facilitatescommunication between users in different regions, countries or cultureswithout having to involve an individual who is multilingual.Additionally, dialogs between users can include these or othertranslation features to facilitate chat-like communication in real-timeor near-real-time.

Accordingly, a first example embodiment may involve a databasecontaining a plurality of items related to a software application,wherein a user profile specifies a preferred language, and wherein aparticular item of the plurality of items includes text strings in thepreferred language and in one or more other languages. The first exampleembodiment may also involve one or more processors configured to:generate, for display on a client device associated with the userprofile, a graphical user interface containing (i) the text strings inthe preferred language and in the other languages, (ii) a control fordynamic translation, and (iii) one or more text input controls, whereinthe control for dynamic translation is deactivated, wherein a first setof the text strings in the other languages are displayed within the textinput controls, and wherein a second set of the text strings in theother languages are not displayed within the text input controls;transmit, to the client device, a representation of the graphical userinterface; receive, from the client device and by way of the graphicaluser interface, an indication that the control for dynamic translationhas been activated; possibly in response to receiving the indication,cause the text strings in the other languages to be translated into thepreferred language; generate, for display on the client device, anupdate to the graphical user interface, wherein the graphical userinterface as updated includes translations of the first set of the textstrings into the preferred language appearing adjacent to the first setof the text strings in the other languages, and wherein the graphicaluser interface as updated also includes translations of the second setof the text strings into the preferred language replacing the second setof the text strings in the other languages; and transmit, to the clientdevice, a representation of the graphical user interface as updated.

A second example embodiment may involve retrieving, from a database, aparticular item of a plurality of items related to a softwareapplication, wherein the particular item includes text strings in apreferred language and in one or more other languages. The secondexample embodiment may also involve generating, for display on a clientdevice associated with a user profile that specifies the preferredlanguage, a graphical user interface containing (i) the text strings inthe preferred language and in the other languages, (ii) a control fordynamic translation, and (iii) one or more text input controls, whereinthe control for dynamic translation is deactivated, wherein a first setof the text strings in the other languages are displayed within the textinput controls, and wherein a second set of the text strings in theother languages are not displayed within the text input controls. Thesecond example embodiment may also involve transmitting, to the clientdevice, a representation of the graphical user interface. The secondexample embodiment may also involve receiving, from the client deviceand by way of the graphical user interface, an indication that thecontrol for dynamic translation has been activated. The second exampleembodiment may also involve, possibly in response to receiving theindication, causing the text strings in the other languages to betranslated into the preferred language. The second example embodimentmay also involve generating, for display on the client device, an updateto the graphical user interface, wherein the graphical user interface asupdated includes translations of the first set of the text strings intothe preferred language appearing adjacent to the first set of the textstrings in the other languages, and wherein the graphical user interfaceas updated also includes translations of the second set of the textstrings into the preferred language replacing the second set of the textstrings in the other languages. The second example embodiment may alsoinvolve transmitting, to the client device, a representation of thegraphical user interface as updated.

A third example embodiment may involve a database containing a firstuser profile that specifies a first preferred language of a first userand a second user profile that specifies a second preferred language ofa second user. The third example embodiment may also involve one or moreprocessors configured to: receive, from the first user and within a chatsession hosted by the system, a first set of messages in the firstpreferred language; cause the first set of messages to be translatedinto the second preferred language; provide, to the second user andwithin the chat session, the first set of messages as translated intothe second preferred language; receive, from the second user and withinthe chat session, a second set of messages in the second preferredlanguage; cause the second set of messages to be translated into thefirst preferred language; provide, to the first user and within the chatsession, the second set of messages as translated into the firstpreferred language; store, in persistent storage accessible to thesystem, a first transcript of the chat session in which the first set ofmessages and the second set of messages are in the first preferredlanguage; and store, in the persistent storage, a second transcript ofthe chat session in which the first set of messages and the second setof messages are in the second preferred language.

A fourth example embodiment may involve receiving, from a first user andwithin a chat session, a first set of messages in a first preferredlanguage, wherein a database contains a first user profile thatspecifies the first preferred language is of the first user and a seconduser profile that specifies a second preferred language of a seconduser. The fourth example embodiment may also involve causing the firstset of messages to be translated into the second preferred language. Thefourth example embodiment may also involve providing, to the second userand within the chat session, the first set of messages as translatedinto the second preferred language. The fourth example embodiment mayalso involve receiving, from the second user and within the chatsession, a second set of messages in the second preferred language. Thefourth example embodiment may also involve causing the second set ofmessages to be translated into the first preferred language. The fourthexample embodiment may also involve providing, to the first user andwithin the chat session, the second set of messages as translated intothe first preferred language. The fourth example embodiment may alsoinvolve storing, in persistent storage, a first transcript of the chatsession in which the first set of messages and the second set ofmessages are in the first preferred language. The fourth exampleembodiment may also involve storing, in the persistent storage, a secondtranscript of the chat session in which the first set of messages andthe second set of messages are in the second preferred language.

In a fifth example embodiment, an article of manufacture may include anon-transitory computer-readable medium, having stored thereon programinstructions that, upon execution by a computing system, cause thecomputing system to perform operations in accordance with the first,second, third, and/or fourth example embodiment.

In a sixth example embodiment, a computing system may include at leastone processor, as well as memory and program instructions. The programinstructions may be stored in the memory, and upon execution by the atleast one processor, cause the computing system to perform operations inaccordance with the first, second, third, and/or fourth exampleembodiment.

In a seventh example embodiment, a system may include various means forcarrying out each of the operations of the first, second, third, and/orfourth example embodiment.

These, as well as other embodiments, aspects, advantages, andalternatives, will become apparent to those of ordinary skill in the artby reading the following detailed description, with reference whereappropriate to the accompanying drawings. Further, this summary andother descriptions and figures provided herein are intended toillustrate embodiments by way of example only and, as such, thatnumerous variations are possible. For instance, structural elements andprocess steps can be rearranged, combined, distributed, eliminated, orotherwise changed, while remaining within the scope of the embodimentsas claimed.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 illustrates a schematic drawing of a computing device, inaccordance with example embodiments.

FIG. 2 illustrates a schematic drawing of a server device cluster, inaccordance with example embodiments.

FIG. 3 depicts a remote network management architecture, in accordancewith example embodiments.

FIG. 4 depicts a communication environment involving a remote networkmanagement architecture, in accordance with example embodiments.

FIG. 5A depicts another communication environment involving a remotenetwork management architecture, in accordance with example embodiments.

FIG. 5B is a flow chart, in accordance with example embodiments.

FIG. 6A depicts an incident report, in accordance with exampleembodiments.

FIG. 6B depicts on online chat, in accordance with example embodiments.

FIG. 6C depicts a set of knowledgebase articles, in accordance withexample embodiments.

FIG. 7A depicts a graphical user interface, in accordance with exampleembodiments.

FIG. 7B also depicts a graphical user interface, in accordance withexample embodiments.

FIG. 7C also depicts a graphical user interface, in accordance withexample embodiments.

FIG. 7D also depicts a graphical user interface, in accordance withexample embodiments.

FIG. 7E also depicts a graphical user interface, in accordance withexample embodiments.

FIG. 8A also depicts a graphical user interface, in accordance withexample embodiments.

FIG. 8B also depicts a graphical user interface, in accordance withexample embodiments.

FIG. 8C also depicts a graphical user interface, in accordance withexample embodiments.

FIG. 8D also depicts a graphical user interface, in accordance withexample embodiments.

FIG. 9 is a flow chart, in accordance with example embodiments.

FIG. 10 depicts multiple transcripts of an online chat session, inaccordance with example embodiments.

FIG. 11 depicts translation of a data record that is incorporated intoan online chat session, in accordance with example embodiments.

FIG. 12 depicts a banner indicating that an associated online chatsession has been machine-translated from a source language, inaccordance with example embodiments.

FIG. 13 depicts a transcript of an initial part of an online chatsession, involving a virtual agent, being provided after handoff to ahuman agent, in accordance with example embodiments.

FIG. 14 is a flow chart, in accordance with example embodiments.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Example methods, devices, and systems are described herein. It should beunderstood that the words “example” and “exemplary” are used herein tomean “serving as an example, instance, or illustration.” Any embodimentor feature described herein as being an “example” or “exemplary” is notnecessarily to be construed as preferred or advantageous over otherembodiments or features unless stated as such. Thus, other embodimentscan be utilized and other changes can be made without departing from thescope of the subject matter presented herein.

Accordingly, the example embodiments described herein are not meant tobe limiting. It will be readily understood that the aspects of thepresent disclosure, as generally described herein, and illustrated inthe figures, can be arranged, substituted, combined, separated, anddesigned in a wide variety of different configurations. For example, theseparation of features into “client” and “server” components may occurin a number of ways.

Further, unless context suggests otherwise, the features illustrated ineach of the figures may be used in combination with one another. Thus,the figures should be generally viewed as component aspects of one ormore overall embodiments, with the understanding that not allillustrated features are necessary for each embodiment.

Additionally, any enumeration of elements, blocks, or steps in thisspecification or the claims is for purposes of clarity. Thus, suchenumeration should not be interpreted to require or imply that theseelements, blocks, or steps adhere to a particular arrangement or arecarried out in a particular order.

I. Introduction

A large enterprise is a complex entity with many interrelatedoperations. Some of these are found across the enterprise, such as humanresources (HR), supply chain, information technology (IT), and finance.However, each enterprise also has its own unique operations that provideessential capabilities and/or create competitive advantages.

To support widely-implemented operations, enterprises typically useoff-the-shelf software applications, such as customer relationshipmanagement (CRM) and human capital management (HCM) packages. However,they may also need custom software applications to meet their own uniquerequirements. A large enterprise often has dozens or hundreds of thesecustom software applications. Nonetheless, the advantages provided bythe embodiments herein are not limited to large enterprises and may beapplicable to an enterprise, or any other type of organization, of anysize.

Many such software applications are developed by individual departmentswithin the enterprise. These range from simple spreadsheets tocustom-built software tools and databases. But the proliferation ofsiloed custom software applications has numerous disadvantages. Itnegatively impacts an enterprise's ability to run and grow itsoperations, innovate, and meet regulatory requirements. The enterprisemay find it difficult to integrate, streamline, and enhance itsoperations due to lack of a single system that unifies its subsystemsand data.

To efficiently create custom applications, enterprises would benefitfrom a remotely-hosted application platform that eliminates unnecessarydevelopment complexity. The goal of such a platform would be to reducetime-consuming, repetitive application development tasks so thatsoftware engineers and individuals in other roles can focus ondeveloping unique, high-value features.

In order to achieve this goal, the concept of Application Platform as aService (aPaaS) is introduced, to intelligently automate workflowsthroughout the enterprise. An aPaaS system is hosted remotely from theenterprise, but may access data, applications, and services within theenterprise by way of secure connections. Such an aPaaS system may have anumber of advantageous capabilities and characteristics. Theseadvantages and characteristics may be able to improve the enterprise'soperations and workflows for IT, HR, CRM, customer service, applicationdevelopment, and security.

The aPaaS system may support development and execution ofmodel-view-controller (MVC) applications. MVC applications divide theirfunctionality into three interconnected parts (model, view, andcontroller) in order to isolate representations of information from themanner in which the information is presented to the user, therebyallowing for efficient code reuse and parallel development. Theseapplications may be web-based, and offer create, read, update, delete(CRUD) capabilities. This allows new applications to be built on acommon application infrastructure.

The aPaaS system may support standardized application components, suchas a standardized set of widgets for graphical user interface (GUI)development. In this way, applications built using the aPaaS system havea common look and feel. Other software components and modules may bestandardized as well. In some cases, this look and feel can be brandedor skinned with an enterprise's custom logos and/or color schemes.

The aPaaS system may support the ability to configure the behavior ofapplications using metadata. This allows application behaviors to berapidly adapted to meet specific needs. Such an approach reducesdevelopment time and increases flexibility. Further, the aPaaS systemmay support GUI tools that facilitate metadata creation and management,thus reducing errors in the metadata.

The aPaaS system may support clearly-defined interfaces betweenapplications, so that software developers can avoid unwantedinter-application dependencies. Thus, the aPaaS system may implement aservice layer in which persistent state information and other data arestored.

The aPaaS system may support a rich set of integration features so thatthe applications thereon can interact with legacy applications andthird-party applications. For instance, the aPaaS system may support acustom employee-onboarding system that integrates with legacy HR, IT,and accounting systems.

The aPaaS system may support enterprise-grade security. Furthermore,since the aPaaS system may be remotely hosted, it should also utilizesecurity procedures when it interacts with systems in the enterprise orthird-party networks and services hosted outside of the enterprise. Forexample, the aPaaS system may be configured to share data amongst theenterprise and other parties to detect and identify common securitythreats.

Other features, functionality, and advantages of an aPaaS system mayexist. This description is for purpose of example and is not intended tobe limiting.

As an example of the aPaaS development process, a software developer maybe tasked to create a new application using the aPaaS system. First, thedeveloper may define the data model, which specifies the types of datathat the application uses and the relationships therebetween. Then, viaa GUI of the aPaaS system, the developer enters (e.g., uploads) the datamodel. The aPaaS system automatically creates all of the correspondingdatabase tables, fields, and relationships, which can then be accessedvia an object-oriented services layer.

In addition, the aPaaS system can also build a fully-functional MVCapplication with client-side interfaces and server-side CRUD logic. Thisgenerated application may serve as the basis of further development forthe user. Advantageously, the developer does not have to spend a largeamount of time on basic application functionality. Further, since theapplication may be web-based, it can be accessed from anyInternet-enabled client device. Alternatively or additionally, a localcopy of the application may be able to be accessed, for instance, whenInternet service is not available.

The aPaaS system may also support a rich set of pre-definedfunctionality that can be added to applications. These features includesupport for searching, email, templating, workflow design, reporting,analytics, social media, scripting, mobile-friendly output, andcustomized GUIs.

Such an aPaaS system may represent a GUI in various ways. For example, aserver device of the aPaaS system may generate a representation of a GUIusing a combination of HTML and JAVASCRIPT®. The JAVASCRIPT® may includeclient-side executable code, server-side executable code, or both. Theserver device may transmit or otherwise provide this representation to aclient device for the client device to display on a screen according toits locally-defined look and feel. Alternatively, a representation of aGUI may take other forms, such as an intermediate form (e.g., JAVA®byte-code) that a client device can use to directly generate graphicaloutput therefrom. Other possibilities exist.

Further, user interaction with GUI elements, such as buttons, menus,tabs, sliders, checkboxes, toggles, etc. may be referred to as“selection”, “activation”, or “actuation” thereof. These terms may beused regardless of whether the GUI elements are interacted with by wayof keyboard, pointing device, touchscreen, or another mechanism.

An aPaaS architecture is particularly powerful when integrated with anenterprise's network and used to manage such a network. The followingembodiments describe architectural and functional aspects of exampleaPaaS systems, as well as the features and advantages thereof.

II. Example Computing Devices and Cloud-Based Computing Environments

FIG. 1 is a simplified block diagram exemplifying a computing device100, illustrating some of the components that could be included in acomputing device arranged to operate in accordance with the embodimentsherein. Computing device 100 could be a client device (e.g., a deviceactively operated by a user), a server device (e.g., a device thatprovides computational services to client devices), or some other typeof computational platform. Some server devices may operate as clientdevices from time to time in order to perform particular operations, andsome client devices may incorporate server features.

In this example, computing device 100 includes processor 102, memory104, network interface 106, and input/output unit 108, all of which maybe coupled by system bus 110 or a similar mechanism. In someembodiments, computing device 100 may include other components and/orperipheral devices (e.g., detachable storage, printers, and so on).

Processor 102 may be one or more of any type of computer processingelement, such as a central processing unit (CPU), a co-processor (e.g.,a mathematics, graphics, or encryption co-processor), a digital signalprocessor (DSP), a network processor, and/or a form of integratedcircuit or controller that performs processor operations. In some cases,processor 102 may be one or more single-core processors. In other cases,processor 102 may be one or more multi-core processors with multipleindependent processing units. Processor 102 may also include registermemory for temporarily storing instructions being executed and relateddata, as well as cache memory for temporarily storing recently-usedinstructions and data.

Memory 104 may be any form of computer-usable memory, including but notlimited to random access memory (RAM), read-only memory (ROM), andnon-volatile memory (e.g., flash memory, hard disk drives, solid statedrives, compact discs (CDs), digital video discs (DVDs), and/or tapestorage). Thus, memory 104 represents both main memory units, as well aslong-term storage. Other types of memory may include biological memory.

Memory 104 may store program instructions and/or data on which programinstructions may operate. By way of example, memory 104 may store theseprogram instructions on a non-transitory, computer-readable medium, suchthat the instructions are executable by processor 102 to carry out anyof the methods, processes, or operations disclosed in this specificationor the accompanying drawings.

As shown in FIG. 1 , memory 104 may include firmware 104A, kernel 104B,and/or applications 104C. Firmware 104A may be program code used to bootor otherwise initiate some or all of computing device 100. Kernel 104Bmay be an operating system, including modules for memory management,scheduling and management of processes, input/output, and communication.Kernel 104B may also include device drivers that allow the operatingsystem to communicate with the hardware modules (e.g., memory units,networking interfaces, ports, and buses) of computing device 100.Applications 104C may be one or more user-space software programs, suchas web browsers or email clients, as well as any software libraries usedby these programs. Memory 104 may also store data used by these andother programs and applications.

Network interface 106 may take the form of one or more wirelineinterfaces, such as Ethernet (e.g., Fast Ethernet, Gigabit Ethernet, andso on). Network interface 106 may also support communication over one ormore non-Ethernet media, such as coaxial cables or power lines, or overwide-area media, such as Synchronous Optical Networking (SONET) ordigital subscriber line (DSL) technologies. Network interface 106 mayadditionally take the form of one or more wireless interfaces, such asIEEE 802.11 (Wifi), BLUETOOTH®, global positioning system (GPS), or awide-area wireless interface. However, other forms of physical layerinterfaces and other types of standard or proprietary communicationprotocols may be used over network interface 106. Furthermore, networkinterface 106 may comprise multiple physical interfaces. For instance,some embodiments of computing device 100 may include Ethernet,BLUETOOTH®, and Wifi interfaces.

Input/output unit 108 may facilitate user and peripheral deviceinteraction with computing device 100. Input/output unit 108 may includeone or more types of input devices, such as a keyboard, a mouse, a touchscreen, and so on. Similarly, input/output unit 108 may include one ormore types of output devices, such as a screen, monitor, printer, and/orone or more light emitting diodes (LEDs). Additionally or alternatively,computing device 100 may communicate with other devices using auniversal serial bus (USB) or high-definition multimedia interface(HDMI) port interface, for example.

In some embodiments, one or more computing devices like computing device100 may be deployed to support an aPaaS architecture. The exact physicallocation, connectivity, and configuration of these computing devices maybe unknown and/or unimportant to client devices. Accordingly, thecomputing devices may be referred to as “cloud-based” devices that maybe housed at various remote data center locations.

FIG. 2 depicts a cloud-based server cluster 200 in accordance withexample embodiments. In FIG. 2 , operations of a computing device (e.g.,computing device 100) may be distributed between server devices 202,data storage 204, and routers 206, all of which may be connected bylocal cluster network 208. The number of server devices 202, datastorages 204, and routers 206 in server cluster 200 may depend on thecomputing task(s) and/or applications assigned to server cluster 200.

For example, server devices 202 can be configured to perform variouscomputing tasks of computing device 100. Thus, computing tasks can bedistributed among one or more of server devices 202. To the extent thatthese computing tasks can be performed in parallel, such a distributionof tasks may reduce the total time to complete these tasks and return aresult. For purposes of simplicity, both server cluster 200 andindividual server devices 202 may be referred to as a “server device.”This nomenclature should be understood to imply that one or moredistinct server devices, data storage devices, and cluster routers maybe involved in server device operations.

Data storage 204 may be data storage arrays that include drive arraycontrollers configured to manage read and write access to groups of harddisk drives and/or solid state drives. The drive array controllers,alone or in conjunction with server devices 202, may also be configuredto manage backup or redundant copies of the data stored in data storage204 to protect against drive failures or other types of failures thatprevent one or more of server devices 202 from accessing units of datastorage 204. Other types of memory aside from drives may be used.

Routers 206 may include networking equipment configured to provideinternal and external communications for server cluster 200. Forexample, routers 206 may include one or more packet-switching and/orrouting devices (including switches and/or gateways) configured toprovide (i) network communications between server devices 202 and datastorage 204 via local cluster network 208, and/or (ii) networkcommunications between server cluster 200 and other devices viacommunication link 210 to network 212.

Additionally, the configuration of routers 206 can be based at least inpart on the data communication requirements of server devices 202 anddata storage 204, the latency and throughput of the local clusternetwork 208, the latency, throughput, and cost of communication link210, and/or other factors that may contribute to the cost, speed,fault-tolerance, resiliency, efficiency, and/or other design goals ofthe system architecture.

As a possible example, data storage 204 may include any form ofdatabase, such as a structured query language (SQL) database. Varioustypes of data structures may store the information in such a database,including but not limited to tables, arrays, lists, trees, and tuples.Furthermore, any databases in data storage 204 may be monolithic ordistributed across multiple physical devices.

Server devices 202 may be configured to transmit data to and receivedata from data storage 204. This transmission and retrieval may take theform of SQL queries or other types of database queries, and the outputof such queries, respectively. Additional text, images, video, and/oraudio may be included as well. Furthermore, server devices 202 mayorganize the received data into web page or web applicationrepresentations. Such a representation may take the form of a markuplanguage, such as the hypertext markup language (HTML), the extensiblemarkup language (XML), or some other standardized or proprietary format.Moreover, server devices 202 may have the capability of executingvarious types of computerized scripting languages, such as but notlimited to Perl, Python, PHP Hypertext Preprocessor (PHP), Active ServerPages (ASP), JAVASCRIPT®, and so on. Computer program code written inthese languages may facilitate the providing of web pages to clientdevices, as well as client device interaction with the web pages.Alternatively or additionally, JAVA® may be used to facilitategeneration of web pages and/or to provide web application functionality.

III. Example Remote Network Management Architecture

FIG. 3 depicts a remote network management architecture, in accordancewith example embodiments. This architecture includes three maincomponents—managed network 300, remote network management platform 320,and public cloud networks 340—all connected by way of Internet 350.

A. Managed Networks

Managed network 300 may be, for example, an enterprise network used byan entity for computing and communications tasks, as well as storage ofdata. Thus, managed network 300 may include client devices 302, serverdevices 304, routers 306, virtual machines 308, firewall 310, and/orproxy servers 312. Client devices 302 may be embodied by computingdevice 100, server devices 304 may be embodied by computing device 100or server cluster 200, and routers 306 may be any type of router,switch, or gateway.

Virtual machines 308 may be embodied by one or more of computing device100 or server cluster 200. In general, a virtual machine is an emulationof a computing system, and mimics the functionality (e.g., processor,memory, and communication resources) of a physical computer. Onephysical computing system, such as server cluster 200, may support up tothousands of individual virtual machines. In some embodiments, virtualmachines 308 may be managed by a centralized server device orapplication that facilitates allocation of physical computing resourcesto individual virtual machines, as well as performance and errorreporting. Enterprises often employ virtual machines in order toallocate computing resources in an efficient, as needed fashion.Providers of virtualized computing systems include VMWARE® andMICROSOFT®.

Firewall 310 may be one or more specialized routers or server devicesthat protect managed network 300 from unauthorized attempts to accessthe devices, applications, and services therein, while allowingauthorized communication that is initiated from managed network 300.Firewall 310 may also provide intrusion detection, web filtering, virusscanning, application-layer gateways, and other applications orservices. In some embodiments not shown in FIG. 3 , managed network 300may include one or more virtual private network (VPN) gateways withwhich it communicates with remote network management platform 320 (seebelow).

Managed network 300 may also include one or more proxy servers 312. Anembodiment of proxy servers 312 may be a server application thatfacilitates communication and movement of data between managed network300, remote network management platform 320, and public cloud networks340. In particular, proxy servers 312 may be able to establish andmaintain secure communication sessions with one or more computationalinstances of remote network management platform 320. By way of such asession, remote network management platform 320 may be able to discoverand manage aspects of the architecture and configuration of managednetwork 300 and its components. Possibly with the assistance of proxyservers 312, remote network management platform 320 may also be able todiscover and manage aspects of public cloud networks 340 that are usedby managed network 300.

Firewalls, such as firewall 310, typically deny all communicationsessions that are incoming by way of Internet 350, unless such a sessionwas ultimately initiated from behind the firewall (i.e., from a deviceon managed network 300) or the firewall has been explicitly configuredto support the session. By placing proxy servers 312 behind firewall 310(e.g., within managed network 300 and protected by firewall 310), proxyservers 312 may be able to initiate these communication sessions throughfirewall 310. Thus, firewall 310 might not have to be specificallyconfigured to support incoming sessions from remote network managementplatform 320, thereby avoiding potential security risks to managednetwork 300.

In some cases, managed network 300 may consist of a few devices and asmall number of networks. In other deployments, managed network 300 mayspan multiple physical locations and include hundreds of networks andhundreds of thousands of devices. Thus, the architecture depicted inFIG. 3 is capable of scaling up or down by orders of magnitude.

Furthermore, depending on the size, architecture, and connectivity ofmanaged network 300, a varying number of proxy servers 312 may bedeployed therein. For example, each one of proxy servers 312 may beresponsible for communicating with remote network management platform320 regarding a portion of managed network 300. Alternatively oradditionally, sets of two or more proxy servers may be assigned to sucha portion of managed network 300 for purposes of load balancing,redundancy, and/or high availability.

B. Remote Network Management Platforms

Remote network management platform 320 is a hosted environment thatprovides aPaaS services to users, particularly to the operator ofmanaged network 300. These services may take the form of web-basedportals, for example, using the aforementioned web-based technologies.Thus, a user can securely access remote network management platform 320from, for example, client devices 302, or potentially from a clientdevice outside of managed network 300. By way of the web-based portals,users may design, test, and deploy applications, generate reports, viewanalytics, and perform other tasks.

As shown in FIG. 3 , remote network management platform 320 includesfour computational instances 322, 324, 326, and 328. Each of thesecomputational instances may represent one or more server nodes operatingdedicated copies of the aPaaS software and/or one or more databasenodes. The arrangement of server and database nodes on physical serverdevices and/or virtual machines can be flexible and may vary based onenterprise needs. In combination, these nodes may provide a set of webportals, services, and applications (e.g., a wholly-functioning aPaaSsystem) available to a particular enterprise. In some cases, a singleenterprise may use multiple computational instances.

For example, managed network 300 may be an enterprise customer of remotenetwork management platform 320, and may use computational instances322, 324, and 326. The reason for providing multiple computationalinstances to one customer is that the customer may wish to independentlydevelop, test, and deploy its applications and services. Thus,computational instance 322 may be dedicated to application developmentrelated to managed network 300, computational instance 324 may bededicated to testing these applications, and computational instance 326may be dedicated to the live operation of tested applications andservices. A computational instance may also be referred to as a hostedinstance, a remote instance, a customer instance, or by some otherdesignation. Any application deployed onto a computational instance maybe a scoped application, in that its access to databases within thecomputational instance can be restricted to certain elements therein(e.g., one or more particular database tables or particular rows withinone or more database tables).

For purposes of clarity, the disclosure herein refers to the arrangementof application nodes, database nodes, aPaaS software executing thereon,and underlying hardware as a “computational instance.” Note that usersmay colloquially refer to the graphical user interfaces provided therebyas “instances.” But unless it is defined otherwise herein, a“computational instance” is a computing system disposed within remotenetwork management platform 320.

The multi-instance architecture of remote network management platform320 is in contrast to conventional multi-tenant architectures, overwhich multi-instance architectures exhibit several advantages. Inmulti-tenant architectures, data from different customers (e.g.,enterprises) are comingled in a single database. While these customers'data are separate from one another, the separation is enforced by thesoftware that operates the single database. As a consequence, a securitybreach in this system may impact all customers' data, creatingadditional risk, especially for entities subject to governmental,healthcare, and/or financial regulation. Furthermore, any databaseoperations that impact one customer will likely impact all customerssharing that database. Thus, if there is an outage due to hardware orsoftware errors, this outage affects all such customers. Likewise, ifthe database is to be upgraded to meet the needs of one customer, itwill be unavailable to all customers during the upgrade process. Often,such maintenance windows will be long, due to the size of the shareddatabase.

In contrast, the multi-instance architecture provides each customer withits own database in a dedicated computing instance. This preventscomingling of customer data, and allows each instance to beindependently managed. For example, when one customer's instanceexperiences an outage due to errors or an upgrade, other computationalinstances are not impacted. Maintenance down time is limited because thedatabase only contains one customer's data. Further, the simpler designof the multi-instance architecture allows redundant copies of eachcustomer database and instance to be deployed in a geographicallydiverse fashion. This facilitates high availability, where the liveversion of the customer's instance can be moved when faults are detectedor maintenance is being performed.

In some embodiments, remote network management platform 320 may includeone or more central instances, controlled by the entity that operatesthis platform. Like a computational instance, a central instance mayinclude some number of application and database nodes disposed upon somenumber of physical server devices or virtual machines. Such a centralinstance may serve as a repository for specific configurations ofcomputational instances as well as data that can be shared amongst atleast some of the computational instances. For instance, definitions ofcommon security threats that could occur on the computational instances,software packages that are commonly discovered on the computationalinstances, and/or an application store for applications that can bedeployed to the computational instances may reside in a centralinstance. Computational instances may communicate with central instancesby way of well-defined interfaces in order to obtain this data.

In order to support multiple computational instances in an efficientfashion, remote network management platform 320 may implement aplurality of these instances on a single hardware platform. For example,when the aPaaS system is implemented on a server cluster such as servercluster 200, it may operate virtual machines that dedicate varyingamounts of computational, storage, and communication resources toinstances. But full virtualization of server cluster 200 might not benecessary, and other mechanisms may be used to separate instances. Insome examples, each instance may have a dedicated account and one ormore dedicated databases on server cluster 200. Alternatively, acomputational instance such as computational instance 322 may spanmultiple physical devices.

In some cases, a single server cluster of remote network managementplatform 320 may support multiple independent enterprises. Furthermore,as described below, remote network management platform 320 may includemultiple server clusters deployed in geographically diverse data centersin order to facilitate load balancing, redundancy, and/or highavailability.

C. Public Cloud Networks

Public cloud networks 340 may be remote server devices (e.g., aplurality of server clusters such as server cluster 200) that can beused for outsourced computation, data storage, communication, andservice hosting operations. These servers may be virtualized (i.e., theservers may be virtual machines). Examples of public cloud networks 340may include AMAZON WEB SERVICES® and MICROSOFT® AZURE®. Like remotenetwork management platform 320, multiple server clusters supportingpublic cloud networks 340 may be deployed at geographically diverselocations for purposes of load balancing, redundancy, and/or highavailability.

Managed network 300 may use one or more of public cloud networks 340 todeploy applications and services to its clients and customers. Forinstance, if managed network 300 provides online music streamingservices, public cloud networks 340 may store the music files andprovide web interface and streaming capabilities. In this way, theenterprise of managed network 300 does not have to build and maintainits own servers for these operations.

Remote network management platform 320 may include modules thatintegrate with public cloud networks 340 to expose virtual machines andmanaged services therein to managed network 300. The modules may allowusers to request virtual resources, discover allocated resources, andprovide flexible reporting for public cloud networks 340. In order toestablish this functionality, a user from managed network 300 mightfirst establish an account with public cloud networks 340, and request aset of associated resources. Then, the user may enter the accountinformation into the appropriate modules of remote network managementplatform 320. These modules may then automatically discover themanageable resources in the account, and also provide reports related tousage, performance, and billing.

D. Communication Support and Other Operations

Internet 350 may represent a portion of the global Internet. However,Internet 350 may alternatively represent a different type of network,such as a private wide-area or local-area packet-switched network.

FIG. 4 further illustrates the communication environment between managednetwork 300 and computational instance 322, and introduces additionalfeatures and alternative embodiments. In FIG. 4 , computational instance322 is replicated across data centers 400A and 400B. These data centersmay be geographically distant from one another, perhaps in differentcities or different countries. Each data center includes supportequipment that facilitates communication with managed network 300, aswell as remote users.

In data center 400A, network traffic to and from external devices flowseither through VPN gateway 402A or firewall 404A. VPN gateway 402A maybe peered with VPN gateway 412 of managed network 300 by way of asecurity protocol such as Internet Protocol Security (IPSEC) orTransport Layer Security (TLS). Firewall 404A may be configured to allowaccess from authorized users, such as user 414 and remote user 416, andto deny access to unauthorized users. By way of firewall 404A, theseusers may access computational instance 322, and possibly othercomputational instances. Load balancer 406A may be used to distributetraffic amongst one or more physical or virtual server devices that hostcomputational instance 322. Load balancer 406A may simplify user accessby hiding the internal configuration of data center 400A, (e.g.,computational instance 322) from client devices. For instance, ifcomputational instance 322 includes multiple physical or virtualcomputing devices that share access to multiple databases, load balancer406A may distribute network traffic and processing tasks across thesecomputing devices and databases so that no one computing device ordatabase is significantly busier than the others. In some embodiments,computational instance 322 may include VPN gateway 402A, firewall 404A,and load balancer 406A.

Data center 400B may include its own versions of the components in datacenter 400A. Thus, VPN gateway 402B, firewall 404B, and load balancer406B may perform the same or similar operations as VPN gateway 402A,firewall 404A, and load balancer 406A, respectively. Further, by way ofreal-time or near-real-time database replication and/or otheroperations, computational instance 322 may exist simultaneously in datacenters 400A and 400B.

Data centers 400A and 400B as shown in FIG. 4 may facilitate redundancyand high availability. In the configuration of FIG. 4 , data center 400Ais active and data center 400B is passive. Thus, data center 400A isserving all traffic to and from managed network 300, while the versionof computational instance 322 in data center 400B is being updated innear-real-time. Other configurations, such as one in which both datacenters are active, may be supported.

Should data center 400A fail in some fashion or otherwise becomeunavailable to users, data center 400B can take over as the active datacenter. For example, domain name system (DNS) servers that associate adomain name of computational instance 322 with one or more InternetProtocol (IP) addresses of data center 400A may re-associate the domainname with one or more IP addresses of data center 400B. After thisre-association completes (which may take less than one second or severalseconds), users may access computational instance 322 by way of datacenter 400B.

FIG. 4 also illustrates a possible configuration of managed network 300.As noted above, proxy servers 312 and user 414 may access computationalinstance 322 through firewall 310. Proxy servers 312 may also accessconfiguration items 410. In FIG. 4 , configuration items 410 may referto any or all of client devices 302, server devices 304, routers 306,and virtual machines 308, any applications or services executingthereon, as well as relationships between devices, applications, andservices. Thus, the term “configuration items” may be shorthand for anyphysical or virtual device, or any application or service remotelydiscoverable or managed by computational instance 322, or relationshipsbetween discovered devices, applications, and services. Configurationitems may be represented in a configuration management database (CMDB)of computational instance 322.

As noted above, VPN gateway 412 may provide a dedicated VPN to VPNgateway 402A. Such a VPN may be helpful when there is a significantamount of traffic between managed network 300 and computational instance322, or security policies otherwise suggest or require use of a VPNbetween these sites. In some embodiments, any device in managed network300 and/or computational instance 322 that directly communicates via theVPN is assigned a public IP address. Other devices in managed network300 and/or computational instance 322 may be assigned private IPaddresses (e.g., IP addresses selected from the 10.0.0.0-10.255.255.255or 192.168.0.0-192.168.255.255 ranges, represented in shorthand assubnets 10.0.0.0/8 and 192.168.0.0/16, respectively).

IV. Example Device, Application, and Service Discovery

In order for remote network management platform 320 to administer thedevices, applications, and services of managed network 300, remotenetwork management platform 320 may first determine what devices arepresent in managed network 300, the configurations and operationalstatuses of these devices, and the applications and services provided bythe devices, as well as the relationships between discovered devices,applications, and services. As noted above, each device, application,service, and relationship may be referred to as a configuration item.The process of defining configuration items within managed network 300is referred to as discovery, and may be facilitated at least in part byproxy servers 312.

For purposes of the embodiments herein, an “application” may refer toone or more processes, threads, programs, client modules, servermodules, or any other software that executes on a device or group ofdevices. A “service” may refer to a high-level capability provided bymultiple applications executing on one or more devices working inconjunction with one another. For example, a high-level web service mayinvolve multiple web application server threads executing on one deviceand accessing information from a database application that executes onanother device.

FIG. 5A provides a logical depiction of how configuration items can bediscovered, as well as how information related to discoveredconfiguration items can be stored. For sake of simplicity, remotenetwork management platform 320, public cloud networks 340, and Internet350 are not shown.

In FIG. 5A, CMDB 500 and task list 502 are stored within computationalinstance 322. Computational instance 322 may transmit discovery commandsto proxy servers 312. In response, proxy servers 312 may transmit probesto various devices, applications, and services in managed network 300.These devices, applications, and services may transmit responses toproxy servers 312, and proxy servers 312 may then provide informationregarding discovered configuration items to CMDB 500 for storagetherein. Configuration items stored in CMDB 500 represent theenvironment of managed network 300.

Task list 502 represents a list of activities that proxy servers 312 areto perform on behalf of computational instance 322. As discovery takesplace, task list 502 is populated. Proxy servers 312 repeatedly querytask list 502, obtain the next task therein, and perform this task untiltask list 502 is empty or another stopping condition has been reached.

To facilitate discovery, proxy servers 312 may be configured withinformation regarding one or more subnets in managed network 300 thatare reachable by way of proxy servers 312. For instance, proxy servers312 may be given the IP address range 192.168.0/24 as a subnet. Then,computational instance 322 may store this information in CMDB 500 andplace tasks in task list 502 for discovery of devices at each of theseaddresses.

FIG. 5A also depicts devices, applications, and services in managednetwork 300 as configuration items 504, 506, 508, 510, and 512. As notedabove, these configuration items represent a set of physical and/orvirtual devices (e.g., client devices, server devices, routers, orvirtual machines), applications executing thereon (e.g., web servers,email servers, databases, or storage arrays), relationshipstherebetween, as well as services that involve multiple individualconfiguration items.

Placing the tasks in task list 502 may trigger or otherwise cause proxyservers 312 to begin discovery. Alternatively or additionally, discoverymay be manually triggered or automatically triggered based on triggeringevents (e.g., discovery may automatically begin once per day at aparticular time).

In general, discovery may proceed in four logical phases: scanning,classification, identification, and exploration. Each phase of discoveryinvolves various types of probe messages being transmitted by proxyservers 312 to one or more devices in managed network 300. The responsesto these probes may be received and processed by proxy servers 312, andrepresentations thereof may be transmitted to CMDB 500. Thus, each phasecan result in more configuration items being discovered and stored inCMDB 500.

In the scanning phase, proxy servers 312 may probe each IP address inthe specified range of IP addresses for open Transmission ControlProtocol (TCP) and/or User Datagram Protocol (UDP) ports to determinethe general type of device. The presence of such open ports at an IPaddress may indicate that a particular application is operating on thedevice that is assigned the IP address, which in turn may identify theoperating system used by the device. For example, if TCP port 135 isopen, then the device is likely executing a WINDOWS® operating system.Similarly, if TCP port 22 is open, then the device is likely executing aUNIX® operating system, such as LINUX®. If UDP port 161 is open, thenthe device may be able to be further identified through the SimpleNetwork Management Protocol (SNMP). Other possibilities exist. Once thepresence of a device at a particular IP address and its open ports havebeen discovered, these configuration items are saved in CMDB 500.

In the classification phase, proxy servers 312 may further probe eachdiscovered device to determine the version of its operating system. Theprobes used for a particular device are based on information gatheredabout the devices during the scanning phase. For example, if a device isfound with TCP port 22 open, a set of UNIX®-specific probes may be used.Likewise, if a device is found with TCP port 135 open, a set ofWINDOWS®-specific probes may be used. For either case, an appropriateset of tasks may be placed in task list 502 for proxy servers 312 tocarry out. These tasks may result in proxy servers 312 logging on, orotherwise accessing information from the particular device. Forinstance, if TCP port 22 is open, proxy servers 312 may be instructed toinitiate a Secure Shell (SSH) connection to the particular device andobtain information about the operating system thereon from particularlocations in the file system. Based on this information, the operatingsystem may be determined. As an example, a UNIX® device with TCP port 22open may be classified as AIX®, HPUX, LINUX®, MACOS®, or SOLARIS®. Thisclassification information may be stored as one or more configurationitems in CMDB 500.

In the identification phase, proxy servers 312 may determine specificdetails about a classified device. The probes used during this phase maybe based on information gathered about the particular devices during theclassification phase. For example, if a device was classified as LINUX®,a set of LINUX®-specific probes may be used. Likewise, if a device wasclassified as WINDOWS® 2012, as a set of WINDOWS®-2012-specific probesmay be used. As was the case for the classification phase, anappropriate set of tasks may be placed in task list 502 for proxyservers 312 to carry out. These tasks may result in proxy servers 312reading information from the particular device, such as basicinput/output system (BIOS) information, serial numbers, networkinterface information, media access control address(es) assigned tothese network interface(s), IP address(es) used by the particular deviceand so on. This identification information may be stored as one or moreconfiguration items in CMDB 500.

In the exploration phase, proxy servers 312 may determine furtherdetails about the operational state of a classified device. The probesused during this phase may be based on information gathered about theparticular devices during the classification phase and/or theidentification phase. Again, an appropriate set of tasks may be placedin task list 502 for proxy servers 312 to carry out. These tasks mayresult in proxy servers 312 reading additional information from theparticular device, such as processor information, memory information,lists of running processes (applications), and so on. Once more, thediscovered information may be stored as one or more configuration itemsin CMDB 500.

Running discovery on a network device, such as a router, may utilizeSNMP. Instead of or in addition to determining a list of runningprocesses or other application-related information, discovery maydetermine additional subnets known to the router and the operationalstate of the router's network interfaces (e.g., active, inactive, queuelength, number of packets dropped, etc.). The IP addresses of theadditional subnets may be candidates for further discovery procedures.Thus, discovery may progress iteratively or recursively.

Once discovery completes, a snapshot representation of each discovereddevice, application, and service is available in CMDB 500. For example,after discovery, operating system version, hardware configuration, andnetwork configuration details for client devices, server devices, androuters in managed network 300, as well as applications executingthereon, may be stored. This collected information may be presented to auser in various ways to allow the user to view the hardware compositionand operational status of devices, as well as the characteristics ofservices that span multiple devices and applications.

Furthermore, CMDB 500 may include entries regarding dependencies andrelationships between configuration items. More specifically, anapplication that is executing on a particular server device, as well asthe services that rely on this application, may be represented as suchin CMDB 500. For example, suppose that a database application isexecuting on a server device, and that this database application is usedby a new employee onboarding service as well as a payroll service. Thus,if the server device is taken out of operation for maintenance, it isclear that the employee onboarding service and payroll service will beimpacted. Likewise, the dependencies and relationships betweenconfiguration items may be able to represent the services impacted whena particular router fails.

In general, dependencies and relationships between configuration itemsmay be displayed on a web-based interface and represented in ahierarchical fashion. Thus, adding, changing, or removing suchdependencies and relationships may be accomplished by way of thisinterface.

Furthermore, users from managed network 300 may develop workflows thatallow certain coordinated activities to take place across multiplediscovered devices. For instance, an IT workflow might allow the user tochange the common administrator password to all discovered LINUX®devices in a single operation.

In order for discovery to take place in the manner described above,proxy servers 312, CMDB 500, and/or one or more credential stores may beconfigured with credentials for one or more of the devices to bediscovered. Credentials may include any type of information needed inorder to access the devices. These may include userid/password pairs,certificates, and so on. In some embodiments, these credentials may bestored in encrypted fields of CMDB 500. Proxy servers 312 may containthe decryption key for the credentials so that proxy servers 312 can usethese credentials to log on to or otherwise access devices beingdiscovered.

The discovery process is depicted as a flow chart in FIG. 5B. At block520, the task list in the computational instance is populated, forinstance, with a range of IP addresses. At block 522, the scanning phasetakes place. Thus, the proxy servers probe the IP addresses for devicesusing these IP addresses, and attempt to determine the operating systemsthat are executing on these devices. At block 524, the classificationphase takes place. The proxy servers attempt to determine the operatingsystem version of the discovered devices. At block 526, theidentification phase takes place. The proxy servers attempt to determinethe hardware and/or software configuration of the discovered devices. Atblock 528, the exploration phase takes place. The proxy servers attemptto determine the operational state and applications executing on thediscovered devices. At block 530, further editing of the configurationitems representing the discovered devices and applications may takeplace. This editing may be automated and/or manual in nature.

The blocks represented in FIG. 5B are examples. Discovery may be ahighly configurable procedure that can have more or fewer phases, andthe operations of each phase may vary. In some cases, one or more phasesmay be customized, or may otherwise deviate from the exemplarydescriptions above.

In this manner, a remote network management platform may discover andinventory the hardware, software, and services deployed on and providedby the managed network. As noted above, this data may be stored in aCMDB of the associated computational instance as configuration items.For example, individual hardware components (e.g., computing devices,virtual servers, databases, routers, etc.) may be represented ashardware configuration items, while the applications installed and/orexecuting thereon may be represented as software configuration items.

The relationship between a software configuration item installed orexecuting on a hardware configuration item may take various forms, suchas “is hosted on”, “runs on”, or “depends on”. Thus, a databaseapplication installed on a server device may have the relationship “ishosted on” with the server device to indicate that the databaseapplication is hosted on the server device. In some embodiments, theserver device may have a reciprocal relationship of “used by” with thedatabase application to indicate that the server device is used by thedatabase application. These relationships may be automatically foundusing the discovery procedures described above, though it is possible tomanually set relationships as well.

The relationship between a service and one or more softwareconfiguration items may also take various forms. As an example, a webservice may include a web server software configuration item and adatabase application software configuration item, each installed ondifferent hardware configuration items. The web service may have a“depends on” relationship with both of these software configurationitems, while the software configuration items have a “used by”reciprocal relationship with the web service. Services might not be ableto be fully determined by discovery procedures, and instead may rely onservice mapping (e.g., probing configuration files and/or carrying outnetwork traffic analysis to determine service level relationshipsbetween configuration items) and possibly some extent of manualconfiguration.

Regardless of how relationship information is obtained, it can bevaluable for the operation of a managed network. Notably, IT personnelcan quickly determine where certain software applications are deployed,and what configuration items make up a service. This allows for rapidpinpointing of root causes of service outages or degradation. Forexample, if two different services are suffering from slow responsetimes, the CMDB can be queried (perhaps among other activities) todetermine that the root cause is a database application that is used byboth services having high processor utilization. Thus, IT personnel canaddress the database application rather than waste time considering thehealth and performance of other configuration items that make up theservices.

V. It Applications with Translatable Information

As noted above, the expansion of enterprises has led to situations whereenterprise employees, customers, and users in general may not all speakthe same language. This can result in confusion, delays, and errors inoperations as there may be a need for translation between nativelanguages, and some of these translations may not be sufficientlyaccurate. In order to understand the scope of the problem, it is helpfulto review types of applications that may be supported in an enterprise.

A remote network management platform may support multiple applicationsby way of graphical user interfaces presented to users of computationalinstances. Each of these applications may display textual informationduring its operation. This textual information may be a candidate fortranslation so that users who do not share a common language can stillcommunicate. In this section, records from three types of applicationsare discussed: incident reports, online chat records, and knowledgebasearticles. But the embodiments herein may apply to other types of ITrecords or non-IT records.

A. Incident Reports

Incident reports are often opened by IT users to describe a problem thatthey have experienced. Each incident report may also be referred to as arecord. While incident reports may exist in various formats and containvarious types of information, an example incident report 600 is shown inFIG. 6A. Incident report 600 consists of a number of fields in the leftcolumn, at least some of which are associated with values in the rightcolumn.

Field 602 identifies the originator of the incident, in this case BobSmith. Field 604 identifies the time at which the incident was created,in this case 9:56 AM on Feb. 7, 2018. Field 605 is a text string thatprovides a short description of the problem. Field 606 is a descriptionof the problem, as provided by the originator. Thus, field 606 may be afree-form text string containing anywhere from a few words to severalsentences or more. Field 608 is a categorization of the incident, inthis case email. This categorization may be provided by the originator,the IT personnel to whom the incident is assigned, or automaticallybased on the context of the problem description field.

Field 610 identifies the IT personnel to whom the incident is assigned(if applicable), in this case Alice Jones. Field 612 identifies thestatus of the incident. The status may be one of “open,” “assigned,”“working,” or “resolved” for instance. Field 614 identifies how theincident was resolved (if applicable). This field may be filled out bythe IT personnel to whom the incident is assigned or another individual.Field 616 identifies the time at which the incident was resolved, inthis case 10:10 AM on Feb. 7, 2018. Field 618 specifies the closure codeof the incident (if applicable) and can take on values such as “closed(permanently)”, “closed (work around)”, “closed (cannot reproduce)”,etc. Field 620 identifies any additional notes added to the record, suchas by the IT personnel to whom the incident is assigned. Field 622identifies a link to an online article that may help users avoid havingto address a similar issue in the future. Field 622 might not be filledout in all records.

Incident report 600 is presented for purposes of example. Other types ofincident reports may be used, and these reports may contain more, fewer,and/or different fields. For example, a priority field may indicate therelative important and/or urgency of the problem described in theincident report.

Incident reports, such as incident report 600, may be created in variousways. For instance, by way of a web form, an email sent to a designatedaddress, a voicemail box using speech-to-text conversion, and so on.These incident reports may be stored in an incident report database ortable therein that can be queried. As an example, a query in the form ofa text string could return one or more incident reports that contain thewords in the text string.

B. Online Chat Records

Online chat systems are one-to-one, one-to-many, or many-to-manymessaging applications that allow users to communicate with one anotherusing text, audio, images, and/or video. One or more users may join achat room, and messages that each user types into a text entry box maybe transmitted to all users in the room. This allows information to beshared in a semi-real-time manner, more quickly and interactively thanvia email for example.

Enterprise IT departments may allow technology users to confer with ITpersonnel by way of online chat systems. Incoming chat requests may bequeued for servicing by IT personnel when the latter become available.Once engaged, the chat session may involve back-and-forth messagingbetween the user and an agent. As these messages may be helpful forauditing purposes, as well as for identifying common types of ITproblems, records of online chats may be stored in a database.

In some cases, enterprises may use virtual agents. A virtual agent is aprogram that simulates a live human agent by using pre-defined ordynamically generated messages arranged in a conversation flow that isintended to answer a user's question or solve a user's problem. In somecases, all incoming chat requests may be initially answered by virtualagents that will either address the user's request or hand off the chatto a human agent.

FIG. 6B depicts example online chat record 630. It consists of severalmessages between participants Alice and Bob. Bob might or might not be avirtual agent. Each message in online chat record 630 includesindications of the sender 632, the recipient 634, a timestamp 636 ofwhen the message was sent, and the content 638 of the message.

Many online chat records may be stored in a database. This database maybe queried to determine how IT personnel have addressed technologyproblems and requests in the past.

C. Knowledgebase Articles

Unlike incident reports and online chat records, both of which providesome indication of how a specific user's problem or request wasresolved, knowledgebase articles are longer, pre-written guides or setsof instructions for addressing certain types of problems. Often, manyusers have the same technology problems over and over, such as how toreset their enterprise passwords or how to access Wifi networks invarious locations. Thus, IT personnel may write knowledgebase articlesthat address these issues. These articles may take the form of flatfiles, hyperlinked files, database content, or combinations thereof.

In general, knowledgebase articles are longer, more detailed, and morepedagogical than the information in incident reports or online chatrecords. Therefore, they provide a way for users or IT personnel toquickly address common problems.

FIG. 6C depicts knowledgebase 640, which may be a database file server,or some other form of storage. Knowledgebase 640 contains five articles642, 644, 646, 648, and 650, addressing password reset, Wifi access, newlaptop requests, spam filter access, and VPN software installation,respectively. Other topics may be present.

VI. Example Graphical User Interfaces Facilitating Translation

For any of the applications described above, as well as otherapplications supported by a computational instance of a remote networkmanagement platform, translation can be facilitated by a number ofdistinct user interface capabilities. These capabilities may beimplemented using program logic to generate user interfaces andvariations thereof, and information may be stored in database records inorder to save configurations and translations of application content.

Herein, the term “content” may be used to refer to what is beingtranslated. This content may be textual in nature (e.g., ASCII orUnicode text), but also may include images with or without textualmatter as well as other types of content. For example, images may be“translated” by replacing one with another, where the replacement imageis in better accordance with the language and or culture to whichtranslation is desired. Thus, translations are not limited to text eventhough the examples herein are text-oriented.

In a multi-language environment, each user of a computational instancemay be able to select his or her preferred language. This is thelanguage in which the user wishes to view content. Thus, for example,some users may select English as their preferred language, while othersmay select French, Spanish, Chinese, and so on. Nonetheless, other usersmay enter data into the computational instance in their own preferredlanguages. This can result in certain items within applications havingdata in multiple languages. Consequently, it may be difficult for anyone user to make sense of the item as a whole.

As an example, FIG. 7A depicts a graphical user interface for anincident report. This graphical user interface includes panes 700, 704,710, 716, and 722, each containing a number of graphical and/or textualelements. Some of the textual elements are in different languages.Notably, the graphical user interface of FIG. 7A is shown for purposesof illustration, and other types of content and/or arrangements ofcontent may be used without departing from the embodiments herein.

Throughout the discussion of FIGS. 7A, 7B, 7C, 7D, and 7E, it is assumedthat the user's preferred language is English, and that non-English textappearing in the associated graphical user interfaces can be detectedand translated to English. For example, a detection module may be ableto determine the language of various units of content by considering thetype of script (e.g., Latin, Cyrillic, Arabic, or Chinese), wordspresent, and character patterns used within each unit of content.Further, the system may use an internal or external translation model orservice (e.g., GOOGLE® Translate, IBM® Language Translator, orMICROSOFT® Translator) that is pre-trained for translating various inputlanguages to various output languages.

A user or system administrator may select a particular externaltranslation model or service for use with dynamic translation. In someembodiments, the computational instance may block certain types ofpersonally identifying information (e.g., email addresses, postaladdresses, phone numbers, government identifiers, and/or credit cardnumbers) from being transmitted to the selected external translationmodel or service.

Pane 700 includes dynamic translation button 702. This button isrepresented as a movable switch or toggle that can be used to turn offor on dynamic translation of content on the graphical user interfaces.In FIG. 7A, button 702 is set to “off”, which indicates that dynamictranslation of elements is not being shown. A user may select, actuate,or otherwise activate button 702 to turn dynamic translation on.

Pane 704 includes general information related to the incident report,including text 706 prominently displaying its short description (inCroatian), as well as a depiction of its state (“In progress”) andpriority (“1-Critical”). Pane 704 also includes actuatable buttons 724and 726. These buttons may also be referred to as “controls” and mightnot always appear in the form of buttons. When actuated, button 724changes the state of the incident report to “Resolved”. When actuated,button 726 saves any changes made to the incident report. Pane 704further includes selectable tabs that control what is displayed belowpane 704. As shown, details tab 708 is selected, which causes panes 710,716, and 722 to be displayed.

Pane 710 depicts the incident report's state and priority again, thistime in drop down menus so that the current values can be changed. Pane710 also includes editable versions of the incident report's shortdescription and description (both in Croatian) in text input boxes 712and 714, respectively. Notably, these text input boxes (which may alsobe referred to as “text input controls” and might not always appear asboxes) are depicted with dashed lines to indicate that the user can editthe text therein. Thus, any changes made to this text would be saved todatabase upon actuation of button 726.

Pane 716 includes an activity text box in which the user can enteractivity taken regarding the incident report (currently this text box isempty), as well as a history of such activities. Activity record 718includes text entered in Croatian, while activity record 720 includestext entered in English. Notably, the text in activity records 718 and720 represent a dialog between users writing in Croatian and Englishpresented in reverse chronological order.

Pane 722 includes brief summaries three other incident reports deemed tobe possibly related to this incident report. In particular, an agentassist module may conduct a contextual search for additional incidentsrelated to the displayed incident report. This may involve, in the casewhere multiple languages are represented in the incident database,translating at least parts of the incident reports into a commonlanguage and performing the contextual search on the translated incidentreports. While one of these possibly related incidents is in English(INC00012347), another is in French (INC00012345) and yet another is inSpanish (INC00012346).

When a remote network management platform is deployed in multiplecountries or regions, it is virtually inevitable that users will speakdisparate languages. This implies that, in some situations, two or moreusers who communicate via an application will be unable to find a commonlanguage in which both have a reasonable degree of fluency. As a result,enterprise operations are likely to be slowed by this communicationbarrier, and misunderstandings and mistakes become more likely.

In order to address these and other issues, the embodiments hereinfacilitate dynamic translation from one or more source languages into apreferred language of a user. The procedures and outcomes of suchtranslations are shown in FIGS. 7B-7E.

FIG. 7B depicts the graphical user interface of FIG. 7A with button 702actuated to the “On” position. Doing so causes dynamic translation ofall non-preferred languages appearing in the graphical user interfaceinto the preferred language. In these embodiments, it is assumed thatthe preferred language is English. Thus, the text in Croatian, French,and Spanish is translated to English.

In particular, text that is not appearing in a text input box istranslated in place, with the translation to English replacing oroverwriting the text in the non-preferred language. This is shown fortext 706, activity records 718 and 720, and related incident reports ofpane 722. On the other hand, the non-English text appearing in textinput boxes 712 and 714 is kept in place while the English translationsof these texts, text boxes 712A and 714A respectively, appear belowtheir associated non-English texts.

Not translating the content of text input boxes 712 and 714 in placeavoids the English translations accidentally being saved to databaseshould the user actuate save button 726. Keeping a copy of the original,non-translated text as a “ground truth” source is beneficial, as not alltranslations will perfectly capture the nuances of the original text.

Thus, when translating a graphical user interface—such as the onedepicted in FIG. 7A—into the preferred language, the computationalinstance may detect the language of each unit of text on the graphicaluser interface, and then for each unit of text not in the preferredlanguage, translate that text to the preferred language. For units oftext not in text input boxes (or that otherwise cannot be changed by theuser), the computational instance replaces the original text with theassociated translation on the graphical user interface. For units oftext in the text input boxes, the computational instance creates a newtext box, container, or user interface element with the translationpositioned respectively adjacent to the original text. Alternatively,the computational instance may just display the translation positionedas such. Here, the term adjacent may mean immediately above, below tothe left of, to the right of, or within a predetermined distance (e.g.,in pixels, inches, or millimeters) of the original text.

Notably, the translation may be display-only, in that it is shown on thegraphical user interface, but does not get written to database in a waythat replaces the original, non-translated text. In some embodiments,however, the translated text may be stored in a cache (e.g., within thecomputational instance) for a period of time (e.g., minutes, hours, ordays) so that cached translations can be used instead of submitting thenon-translated text to a translation model or service. This savescomputational power and helps provide common translations rapidly.

In FIG. 7B, highlight translated button 728 is also present. This buttonmay appear when dynamic translation button 702 is set to “On”, and maydisappear when dynamic translation button 702 is set to “Off”. Actuatinghighlight translated button 728 may result in translated text on thegraphical user interface being highlighted or otherwise emphasized.

Such highlighting is shown in FIG. 7C. Particularly, text 706, text box712A, text box 714A, the user-entered text in in activity record 718,and the user-entered text in related incidents of pane 722 are allhighlighted with a shaded background. In practice, this backgroundshading may be yellow, red, green, or any color that helps emphasize thetranslated text. In alternative embodiments, the highlighting may makethe text bold, italicized, underlined, or emphasized in some otherfashion.

This highlighting feature is useful because it allows the user torapidly determine which text has been translated to the preferredlanguage (in this case, English). In situations where the text appearingon the graphical user interface is stilted, awkward, or hard tounderstand, the user can decide if these properties are due to possibletranslation errors, and the user can potentially obtain anothertranslation of the original text (e.g., by copying and pasting theoriginal text into a web-based translation model or service).

In further embodiments, hovering a cursor or mouse pointer overtranslated text (highlighted or not) may cause a popup window to appearshowing the non-translated version of the text. This is depicted in FIG.7D, where mouse pointer 730 is hovering over the translation of theuser-entered text in in activity record 718. Popup window 732 isdisplayed, showing the original, non-translated version of this text.

Additionally, popup window 732 includes a query asking the user, “Doesthe translation seem accurate?” This query is accompanied by two buttonsallowing the user to answer “yes” or “no”. In this way, popup window 732allows bilingual users to provide feedback regarding the accuracy of thetranslation. In some embodiments, this feedback may be used to updateand potentially improve the translation model or service.

FIG. 7E depicts the result of the user actuating child incidents tab740. Panes 710 and 716 are replaced with pane 742. Pane 742 provides alist of further incident reports that have been marked as being relatedto the displayed incident report. Since dynamic translation button isstill set to “On”, the computational instance translates child incidenttext in non-preferred languages into the preferred language. As shown inFIG. 7E, this occurs for text 744 and text 746. Since highlighttranslated button 728 is also set to “On”, text 744 and text 746 arehighlighted.

While FIGS. 7A-7E depict translation from non-preferred languagesCroatian, French, and Spanish into the preferred language of English,other translations are possible. The embodiments herein facilitatetranslation from any one or more non-preferred language into anypreferred language.

In various embodiments, other users of the graphical user interface mayhave different preferred languages, and the dynamic translation featuredescribed above may adapt to these changes by translating otherlanguages into these users preferred languages. For example, if a userhas a preferred language of Croatian, the non-Croatian text shown inFIG. 7A may be translated to Croatian.

Further, a user may change his or her preferred language at any time andthe computational instance may re-generate the graphical user interfaceaccordingly. Thus, for example, if a user changes his or her preferredlanguage from English to Spanish while the graphical user interface ofFIG. 7B is displayed, the text that was originally in Spanish will bedisplayed while all other text may be translated into Spanish.

The following algorithm outlines how the above translation andhighlighting may occur. Variations of this algorithm may exist in whichfeatures are omitted, additional features are added, or the featuresbelow are performed in a different order or combined in some fashion.The algorithm assumes that the graphical user interfaces herein areexpressed HTML as web pages in the form of a document object model(DOM). The DOM is a tree or tree-like representation of a unit of amarkup language (e.g., an XML, HTML, or JSON file). But other non-HTMLand/or non-DOM representations may be used.

A first feature may involve loading an HTML page (representing agraphical user interface), obtaining therefrom the parent node of DOM,and parsing the page's HTML nodes recursively using until all the HTMLelements have been considered. A second feature may involve creating adata structure to keep track of the HTML elements (in the current HTMLpage) in the form of key-value pairs. In this data structure, the keymay be the HTML element, and the value may be the content inside thatHTML element.

A third feature may involve detecting that the user has caused button702 to be in the “On” position. This data structure is looped throughand the content which is not in the user's preferred language isidentified. A fourth feature may involve translating this content usingan internal or external translation service as configured in the system.

A fifth feature may involve, when the translation is complete, adding acascading style sheet (CSS) class attribute to the translated contentindicating highlighting. If the field type of the HTML, node is editable(e.g., a text input box), the translated content is added adjacent tothe original content. If the field type is non-editable, only thetranslated content is shown and the original content is hidden, but alink or button is added so that the user can cause the original contentto be displayed.

A sixth feature may involve determining that a user has actuated button728 to the “On” position. In response, the CSS style properties in theclass attribute that was used for the translated content are updated sothat the translated content is highlighted. A seventh feature mayinvolve determining that a user has actuated button 728 to the “Off”position. In response, the CSS style properties that were added in theabove class attribute are removed.

An eighth feature may involve a user actuating button 702 to be in the“Off” position. In response, the original content is displayed. Wheneither button 702 or button 728 is actuated, this selection is activatedacross all the page navigations in the application by using eventlisteners.

FIGS. 8A-8D illustrate additional embodiments related to translation ofa dialog between two or more users. These embodiments may be from anonline chat session or from work notes attached to a representation ofan incident, problem, issue, risk, etc. In various types ofapplications, it may be beneficial for users to exchange information.For example, an incident management application may support storingreal-time or non-real-time chats between users about particularincidents. This might allow the users to come to a better understandingof the problem related to the incident and possible solutions.

Nonetheless, if these users do not speak the same language, such anunderstanding may be more difficult to obtain. Urgent issues may remainunaddressed until personnel with the appropriate language skills areavailable. But with the dynamic translations described herein, languageis no longer a major barrier.

FIG. 8A depicts a graphical user interface for a user with a preferredlanguage of French who is experiencing a problem. This user may havecreated an incident report, and is in the process of describing theproblem. The graphical user interface shown may be a partial interfacethat is coupled or combined with a more generic interface of theincident management application. Nonetheless, it includes panes 800,802, and 812. Other arrangements of various types of information may bepresent in such a graphical user interface.

Pane 800 includes a title “La Gestion des Incidents”, indicating thatthis interface related to incident management. Pane 802 includes diagram806 representing comments entered regarding the present incident inreverse-chronological order. For instance, the user Leo may be able toenter text into text input control 804. This text then appears indiagram 806. For example, entry 810 represents the incident beingcreated, and entry 808 represents Leo providing an initial descriptionof the problem. Each entry with comments includes an actuatable elementlabelled “Traduire” which allows the user to translate the commentstherein into the preferred language of French (since the commentsentered so far are all in French, there is no need for translation yet).Pane 812 includes information identifying and/or describing theincident, such as its number, state, and priority.

FIG. 8B depicts a further graphical user interface that could be used byan administrator with a preferred language of English who has beentasked with resolving the incident. This graphical user interface mayalso be a partial interface that is coupled or combined with a moregeneric interface of the incident management application. Nonetheless,it includes panes 820 and 822. Other arrangements of various types ofinformation may be present in such a graphical user interface.

Pane 820 includes information identifying and/or describing theincident, such as its number, state, and priority. Pane 822 includesrepresents comments entered regarding the present incident inreverse-chronological order. The administrator may be able to enter textinto text input control 824. This text then appears in in the comments.For example, the two comments attributed to Leo are shown as entries 828and 832, respectively. Each entry includes an actuatable elementlabelled “Translate” which allows the administrator to translatecomments therein into the preferred language of English. For entry 828,such a translation of the comment therein has been obtained and is shownin element 830. Given this translation, the administrator nowunderstands the comment from Leo, and responds accordingly in English,as shown in entry 826.

FIG. 8C depicts the same graphical user interface as FIG. 8A, but withthe administrator's comment appearing in entry 814. From this interface,Leo can actuate the “Traduire” button to translate the comment intoFrench. This translation is shown in element 818. Further, entry 816shown Leo's response.

FIG. 8D depicts the same graphical user interface as FIG. 8B, but withLeo's new comment (the response) shown in entry 834. From thisinterface, the administrator can actuate the “Translate” button totranslate the comment into English. This translation is shown in element836.

In this fashion, two or more users that do not share a common languagecan effectively communicate with one another. Additionally, a record oftheir communication, possibly including the translations, can be savedfor future review. This mechanism allows a more flexible and rapidapproach for addressing issues in real-time or near-real-time withouthaving to locate and/or wait for an individual who is fluent in aparticular language.

VII. Example Operations

FIG. 9 is a flow chart illustrating an example embodiment. The processillustrated by FIG. 9 may be carried out by a computing device, such ascomputing device 100, and/or a cluster of computing devices, such asserver cluster 200. However, the process can be carried out by othertypes of devices or device subsystems. For example, the process could becarried out by a computational instance of a remote network managementplatform or a portable computer, such as a laptop or a tablet device.

The embodiments of FIG. 9 may be simplified by the removal of any one ormore of the features shown therein. Further, these embodiments may becombined with features, aspects, and/or implementations of any of theprevious figures or otherwise described herein.

Block 900 may involve retrieving, from a database, a particular item ofa plurality of items related to a software application, wherein theparticular item includes text strings in a preferred language and in oneor more other languages.

Block 902 may involve generating, for display on a client deviceassociated with a user profile that specifies the preferred language, agraphical user interface containing (i) the text strings in thepreferred language and in the other languages, (ii) a control fordynamic translation, and (iii) one or more text input controls, whereinthe control for dynamic translation is deactivated, wherein a first setof the text strings in the other languages are displayed within the textinput controls, and wherein a second set of the text strings in theother languages are not displayed within the text input controls.

Block 904 may involve transmitting, to the client device, arepresentation of the graphical user interface.

Block 906 may involve receiving, from the client device and by way ofthe graphical user interface, an indication that the control for dynamictranslation has been activated.

Block 908 may involve, possibly in response to receiving the indication,causing the text strings in the other languages to be translated intothe preferred language.

Block 910 may involve generating, for display on the client device, anupdate to the graphical user interface, wherein the graphical userinterface as updated includes translations of the first set of the textstrings into the preferred language appearing adjacent to the first setof the text strings in the other languages, and wherein the graphicaluser interface as updated also includes translations of the second setof the text strings into the preferred language replacing the second setof the text strings in the other languages.

Block 912 may involve transmitting, to the client device, arepresentation of the graphical user interface as updated.

In some embodiments, causing the text strings in the other languages tobe translated into the preferred language involves detecting that thetext strings in the other languages are in the other languages;providing, to a translation model or service, the text strings in theother languages with an instruction to translate the text strings in theother languages to the preferred language; and receiving, from thetranslation model or service, translations into the preferred languageof the text strings in the other languages.

In some embodiments, the system stores the translations into thepreferred language in a cache, wherein subsequent requests fortranslation of one or more of the text strings in the other languagesare served by the translations into the preferred language stored in thecache.

In some embodiments, the software application is one of an incidentmanagement application with the items representing incidents, a chatapplication with the items representing chats, or a knowledgebaseapplication with the items representing articles.

In some embodiments, the graphical user interface as updated does notchange positions of the text strings in the preferred language.

In some embodiments, the graphical user interface also includes acontrol for highlighting, wherein the control for highlighting isdeactivated. These embodiments may involve: receiving, from the clientdevice and by way of the graphical user interface as updated, a furtherindication that the control for highlighting has been activated;possibly in response to receiving the further indication, generating,for display on the client device, a further update to the graphical userinterface, wherein the graphical user interface as further updatedhighlights translations into the preferred language; and transmitting,to the client device, a representation of the graphical user interfaceas further updated.

In some embodiments, the highlights include changing, for thetranslations into the preferred language, a background color, a textcolor, or a font.

Some embodiments may further involve: receiving, from the client deviceand by way of the graphical user interface as further updated, anadditional indication that a user-controlled pointer is within bounds ofa particular translation of the translations into the preferredlanguage; possibly in response to receiving the additional indication,generating, for display on the client device, an additional update tothe graphical user interface, wherein the additional update to thegraphical user interface includes a popup window overlaid onto thegraphical user interface, wherein the popup window includes a particulartext string in one of the other languages, and wherein the particulartranslation is a translation of the particular text string; andtransmitting, to the client device, a representation of the graphicaluser interface as additionally updated.

In some embodiments, the popup window includes a first actuatablecontrol and a second actuatable control, wherein receiving actuation ofthe first actuatable control indicates that a user finds the particulartranslation to be accurate, and wherein receiving actuation of thesecond actuatable control indicates that the user finds the particulartranslation to be inaccurate.

In some embodiments, the preferred language is not one of the otherlanguages.

In some embodiments, a second user profile specifies a second preferredlanguage. These embodiments may involve: generating, for display on asecond client device associated with the second user profile, a secondgraphical user interface containing (i) the text strings in thepreferred language and in the other languages, (ii) a second control fordynamic translation, and (iii) one or more further text input controls,wherein the second control for dynamic translation is deactivated,wherein a third set of the text strings are displayed within the furthertext input controls, and wherein a fourth set of the text strings arenot displayed within the further text input controls; transmitting, tothe second client device, a representation of the second graphical userinterface; receiving, from the second client device and by way of thesecond graphical user interface, a second indication that the secondcontrol for dynamic translation has been activated; possibly in responseto receiving the second indication, causing the text strings to betranslated into the second preferred language; generating, for displayon the second client device, an update to the second graphical userinterface, wherein the second graphical user interface as updatedincludes translations of the third set of the text strings into thesecond preferred language appearing adjacent to the third set of thetext strings, and wherein the second graphical user interface as updatedalso includes translations of the fourth set of the text strings intothe second preferred language replacing the fourth set of the textstrings; and transmitting, to the second client device, a representationof the second graphical user interface as updated.

In some embodiments, the second preferred language is one of the otherlanguages.

VIII. Further Features Relating to Translation of Online Chat Sessions

One or more further features may be added to any of the embodimentsdescribed above. These features may also be combined with one anotherand are generally described in the context of online chat or work notetransactions, such as those of FIGS. 8A-8D. For sake of simplicity,these transactions will be referred to as an “online chat session” or a“chat session” and may be associated with an online chat record. Theonline chat record may include one or more transcripts of messages thatwere exchanged between participants of the online chat session. Anyfeature described herein as applying to an online chat session might beapplicable to the translation of work notes as well, in at least somescenarios.

A. Multiple Chat Transcripts with Private Messages

As noted, two or more online chat users who do not share a commonlanguage can effectively communicate with one another by way of livetranslation of chat messages. It can be beneficial to save transcriptsof such a chat session, possibly one in each language that was involvedin the translation. In the example of FIGS. 8A-8D, this means that theuser Leo could later have access to a transcript in French, while theadministrator would have access to a transcript in English.

The user's transcript may be referred to as an external transcript,while the administrator's transcript may be referred to as an internaltranscript. If translations take place between more than two languagesin a session, there may be more than two transcripts (e.g., onetranscript per language).

Moreover, the online chat engine may support private messages betweentwo or more administrators. For example, if one administrator asksanother administrator for assistance, this request and the subsequentreply and/or conversation may take the form of private messages thatonly the administrators can view. Omitting users from private messagesbetween administrators serves to reduce potential user confusion. Thus,when private messages are present in an online chat, they may only bewritten to internal transcripts and not to external transcripts. Thechat user interface for an administrator may include an option or tabfor transmitting such a private message.

An example is shown in FIG. 10 . This example is an extension of thetranslated online chat of FIGS. 8A-8D. Online chat session 1000 containsmessages 1010, 1012, 1014, 1016, 1018, 1020, and 1022 in descendingorder. Messages 1010, 1012, 1014, and 1016 correspond to messages 832,828, 826, and 834, respectively. Messages 1018, 1020, and 1022 are newmessages that do not appear in FIGS. 8A-8D. The messages as shown inonline chat session 1000 are in their original languages, and none aretranslated (naturally, they will be translated as needed into thelanguage of the intended recipient(s)).

Message 1018 involves the administrator (Admin) transmitting a privatemessage to another administrator (Admin2), asking for help in addressingLeo's problem. Message 1020 involves Admin2 transmitting a privatemessage to Admin with a suggestion. Message 1022 involves Admintransmitting a message in the online chat to Leo making this suggestion.

During or at some point after termination of the online chat session,internal and external transcripts may be stored—namely, as internaltranscript 1002 and external transcript 1004. Notably, internaltranscript 1002 contains all messages of online chat session 1000(because it is an internal transcript) translated into English (thepreferred language of Admin). On the other hand, external transcript1004 omits private messages 1018 and 1020 (because it is an externaltranscript) and the messages therein are translated into French (thepreferred language of Leo).

Both transcripts may be attached to or otherwise associated with anunderlying record (e.g., INC0010004). Administrators, such as Admin andAdmin2, may be able to access and review both transcripts. The user,Leo, may not be permitted to access the internal transcript. In fact,Leo may not even be made aware of its existence.

Maintaining transcripts of online chat sessions helps both users andadministrators recall the discussions they had in these sessions. Doingso facilitates further debugging of the user's problem, or might helpthe administrators debug a similar problem in the future that anotheruser is experiencing.

B. Translation of Record Data Incorporated into Online Chats

As shown in FIGS. 8A-8D as well as FIG. 10 , a user can create or referto an incident during an online chat session. The online chat sessionmay be attached to or otherwise associated with that incident. In someembodiments, other types of non-incident record data, such as problems,issues, and so on could be created or referred to in an online chatsession. Further, the online chat session itself may have its own recorddata, that of an interaction between an administrator and user.

In any event, the record data will almost always be entered in theoriginator's preferred language. For example, if the user Leo creates anincident, the incident will likely be in French. Thus, when anadministrator who is not fluent in French attempts to review the datarecord, he or she will be unable to do so without manual translation.Likewise, an administrator could also create a data record (during orafter an online chat session) in his or her preferred language (e.g.,English), which may be difficult for the user to review without manualtranslation.

Regardless of which party creates the data record, it can beincorporated into online chat sessions in whole or in part. For example,the online chat user interface may have options to create the datarecord during the online chat session or to incorporate apreviously-created data record. In either of these cases, the datarecords may be displayed to all users of the online chat session. But ifit is in the preferred language of one user and the online chat sessionis using translation, the data record should be translated as well.

Accordingly, the embodiments herein may include such translation. FIG.11 is a logical depiction of such a translation relating to the onlinechat session depicted in FIGS. 8A-8D and FIG. 10 . The data record is anincident created by the user Leo and incorporated into the online chatsession. Thus, the data record is in French, and a portion thereof isshown in box 1100. When this data record is displayed to Leo in theonline chat session, it is shown without translation. But when it isdisplayed to other's party in the online chat session, it is translatedto that party's preferred language as needed. Thus, if the data recordis displayed to a party with a preferred language of English (e.g.,Admin), it may be translated as shown in box 1102.

This functionality improves the usefulness of online chat sessiontranslation. Participants in such a session would not have to manuallytranslate the fields of a data record to determine its contents, savingvaluable interaction time. Further, since the online chat session istranslated, having untranslated text appear within it would makeparticipants question whether the translation functionality is workingproperly.

C. Translation Banner During Online Chats

As online chat sessions may be translated, it can be helpful to indicateas such on the graphical user interface of the application thatfacilitates the session. For example, if an online chat session is beingtranslated from French to a participant's preferred language of English,the graphical user interface might display a message or bannerindicating that the original language is French. Further, the graphicaluser interface might indicate that this participant is viewing a machinetranslation from French to English. Likewise, if the online chat sessionis also being translated in the other direction from English to French,the graphical user interface might display a message or bannerindicating that the original language is English to the otherparticipant. Also, the graphical user interface might indicate that theother participant is viewing a machine translation from English toFrench.

Doing so serves at least two purposes. First, all participants in theonline chat session are made aware that a machine translation is takingplace, and may therefore proceed accordingly. For example, they maylimit the number of idioms, colloquialisms, and other informalities thatthey enter into the online chat session. Moreover, they may understandthat they need to be more tolerant of mistranslations, such as stiltedgrammar and improperly conjugated verbs. Second, if one of theparticipants is bilingual or multilingual and is fluent in anotherparticipant's preferred language, the bilingual or multilingualparticipant may start using this language directly, thereby eliminatingthe need for translation between these two participants.

FIG. 12 depicts a graphical user interface with such features. Thisgraphical user interface is divided into two panes. On the left, pane1200 includes an active online chat session between Leo and Admin. Thissession is similar to those shown before. Particularly, pane 1200contains banner 1204 and messages 1206. Banner 1204 indicates to theviewing participant that “Messages will be automatically translated fromFrench. You can click on the message to see the original.” Thus, theviewing participant is made aware of the machine translation from theoriginal language.

On the right, pane 1202 shows the associated incident. This incidentcould have been opened by either Leo or Admin. If the online chatsession is not attached to an incident or other data record, pane 1202may be blank or contain a description of the session itself.

D. Bulk Translation of Virtual Agent Chat for Handoff

In some embodiments, initial conversations in an online chat session maybe between a human user and a virtual agent. Virtual agents areautomated to mimic the behavior of a human agent through use of naturallanguage processing, dialog trees, and/or machine learning techniques.Virtual agents may be able to obtain basic information about the humanuser and his or her concern, and may also be able to suggest solutionsto simpler problems. Thus, the use of virtual agents can offload much ofthe burden related to at least initial stages of an online chat sessionfrom human agents. Virtual agent conversations may take place in thepreferred language of the human user.

Nonetheless, virtual agents may not be able to solve certain problems,particularly complex issues. Also, some human users would prefer toconfer with a human agent rather than a virtual agent. Therefore, eitherparty (the human user or of the virtual agent) may be able to initiate ahandoff from the virtual agent to a human agent. When such a handoffoccurs, a transcript of the online chat session so far—between the humanuser and the virtual agent—may be made available to the human agent.

In some cases, this handoff may be to a human agent who is not fluent inthe preferred language of the human user. Thus, the transcript so farshould be translated to the preferred language of the human agent sothat the human agent can understand the context of the session.

FIG. 13 depicts a graphical user interface including the translation ofan online chat transcript being displayed after a handoff from a virtualagent to a human agent. This graphical user interface is divided intotwo panes. On the left, pane 1300 includes an active online chat sessionbetween Leo and Admin along with a transcript of a pre-handoff sessionbetween Leo and a virtual agent. Particularly, pane 1300 containsmessages 1304, 1306, 1308, 1310, and 1312 between Leo and the virtualagent (originally in French), as well as messages 1314, 1316, and 1318between Leo and the human agent (dynamically translated between Frenchand English). All have been translated into English as needed, thepreferred language of the human agent.

On the right, pane 1302 shows the associated incident. This incidentcould have been opened by either Leo or Admin. If the online chatsession is not attached to an incident or other data record, pane 1302may be blank or contain a description of the session itself.

E. Machine Translation Indicated in List of Stored Chats

As a result of supporting translation of online chat messages, someonline chat sessions may include transcripts that weremachine-translated. For example, when searching or browsing throughstored records of online chat sessions, these sessions may be listed oridentified on a graphical user interface in tabular format with columnsfor the fields of the session and each session appearing as an entry ina row. The columns may include, for instance, the session number, whenthe session was opened, the human agent to whom it was assigned, andwhether machine translation was involved.

Indicating machine translation in such a list has a number of benefits.First, it allows users to readily determine whether an online chatsession involved machine translation before even opening the session.Thus, the user may be prepared for occasional stilted grammar andimproperly conjugated verbs in the transcript due to the translation.Second, it allows managers to determine the extent of machinetranslation that is taking place in online chat sessions. If this extentis high for certain languages (e.g., more than 25% of sessions involvingFrench require machine translation), then a manager may decide that morehuman agents fluent in these languages should be hired.

F. Default Mapping of Language Codes

As noted above, the system may use an external translation model orservice (e.g., GOOGLE® Translate, IBM® Language Translator, orMICROSOFT® Translator) that is pre-trained for translating various inputlanguages to various output languages. To use these third-partyservices, the system may send a translation request to such a service.The request may include the text to translate, an indicator of a sourcelanguage of the text, and an indicator of the target language to whichthe text is to be translated.

These indicators may be based on ISO 639-1 language identifiers, whichtake the form of two-letter codes (e.g., “en” for English, “fr” forFrench). Thus, for example, a request to translate the text “pleasereboot your computer” from English to French may take the form of a3-tuple such as (“please reboot your computer”, en, fr).

The third party services, however, may use their own custom variationsof the ISO 639-1 language identifiers, or may use a completely differentset of identifiers. Further, the system may have its own customvariation of the ISO 639-1 language identifiers that is different fromany of the third parties.

Thus, the system may include one or more tables that map between thesystem's language identifiers and those of each of the externaltranslation services. In this fashion, the system will be able to useits own representation of language identifiers internally, but map theselanguage identifiers to those of a third-party service as needed.Notably, this may allow the system to transmit requests to thethird-party services and to parse the corresponding replies in anunambiguous fashion.

IX. Further Example Operations

FIG. 14 is a flow chart illustrating an example embodiment. The processillustrated by FIG. 14 may be carried out by a computing device, such ascomputing device 100, and/or a cluster of computing devices, such asserver cluster 200. However, the process can be carried out by othertypes of devices or device subsystems. For example, the process could becarried out by a computational instance of a remote network managementplatform or a portable computer, such as a laptop or a tablet device.

The embodiments of FIG. 14 may be simplified by the removal of any oneor more of the features shown therein. Further, these embodiments may becombined with features, aspects, and/or implementations of any of theprevious figures or otherwise described herein.

Block 1400 may involve receiving, from a first user and within a chatsession, a first set of messages in a first preferred language, whereina database contains a first user profile that specifies the firstpreferred language is of the first user and a second user profile thatspecifies a second preferred language of a second user.

Block 1402 may involve causing the first set of messages to betranslated into the second preferred language.

Block 1404 may involve providing, to the second user and within the chatsession, the first set of messages as translated into the secondpreferred language.

Block 1406 may involve receiving, from the second user and within thechat session, a second set of messages in the second preferred language.

Block 1408 may involve causing the second set of messages to betranslated into the first preferred language.

Block 1410 may involve providing, to the first user and within the chatsession, the second set of messages as translated into the firstpreferred language.

Block 1412 may involve storing, in persistent storage, a firsttranscript of the chat session in which the first set of messages andthe second set of messages are in the first preferred language; and

Block 1414 may involve storing, in the persistent storage, a secondtranscript of the chat session in which the first set of messages andthe second set of messages are in the second preferred language.

Some embodiments may involve receiving, from the second user and withina private messaging facility of the chat session, a third set ofmessages; providing, to a third user and within the private messagingfacility, the third set of messages; receiving, from the third user andwithin the private messaging facility, a fourth set of messages;providing, to the second user and within the private messaging facility,the fourth set of messages, wherein the first transcript does notinclude the third set of messages and does not include the fourth set ofmessages, and wherein the second transcript includes the third set ofmessages and the fourth set of messages.

In some embodiments, the third set of messages and the fourth set ofmessages are in the second preferred language.

In some embodiments, the chat session is displayed, on a first graphicaluser interface and to the first user, in the first preferred language,wherein the first graphical user interface contains an indication thatcontent of the chat session has been translated by machine from thesecond preferred language.

In some embodiments, the chat session is also displayed, on a secondgraphical user interface to the second user, in the second preferredlanguage, wherein the second graphical user interface contains a furtherindication that the content of the chat session has been translated bymachine from the first preferred language.

In some embodiments, the first user is an end-user or customer, and thesecond user is a human agent.

In some embodiments, an initial portion of the chat session wasconducted between the first user and a virtual agent in the firstpreferred language, wherein the chat session was handed off from thevirtual agent to the human agent, and wherein a graphical user interfacedisplays, to the human agent, a transcript of messages from the initialportion of the chat session that are translated from the first preferredlanguage to the second preferred language.

In some embodiments, the chat session is associated with a data recordof an incident, issue, or problem.

In some embodiments, the data record is in the first preferred language.These embodiments may further involve: receiving, from the first userand within the chat session, a representation of the data record;causing the data record to be translated into the second preferredlanguage; and providing, to the second user and within the chat session,the data record as translated into the second preferred language.

In some embodiments, the data record is in the second preferredlanguage. These embodiments may further involve: receiving, from thesecond user and within the chat session, a representation of the datarecord; causing the data record to be translated into the firstpreferred language; and providing, to the first user and within the chatsession, the data record as translated into the first preferredlanguage.

Some embodiments may involve: generating a graphical user interfacerepresenting a plurality of chat sessions in a list, wherein the chatsession is in the list, and wherein the graphical user interfaceindicates whether each of the plurality of chat sessions involvedmachine translation; and providing, to the second user, a representationof the graphical user interface.

In some embodiments, causing the first set of messages and the secondset of messages to be translated comprises: providing, to a translationmodel or service, the first set of messages and the second set ofmessages with indicators of their respective original languages andtheir respective target languages; and receiving, from the translationmodel or service, translations of the first set of messages and thesecond set of messages into their respective target languages.

In some embodiments, the system represents languages with a first set ofindicators and a translation model or service used for translationsrepresents languages with a second set of indicators, and wherein thesystem includes a table that maps between the first set of indicatorsand the second set of indicators for corresponding languages.

X. Closing

The present disclosure is not to be limited in terms of the particularembodiments described in this application, which are intended asillustrations of various aspects. Many modifications and variations canbe made without departing from its scope, as will be apparent to thoseskilled in the art. Functionally equivalent methods and apparatuseswithin the scope of the disclosure, in addition to those describedherein, will be apparent to those skilled in the art from the foregoingdescriptions. Such modifications and variations are intended to fallwithin the scope of the appended claims.

The above detailed description describes various features and operationsof the disclosed systems, devices, and methods with reference to theaccompanying figures. The example embodiments described herein and inthe figures are not meant to be limiting. Other embodiments can beutilized, and other changes can be made, without departing from thescope of the subject matter presented herein. It will be readilyunderstood that the aspects of the present disclosure, as generallydescribed herein, and illustrated in the figures, can be arranged,substituted, combined, separated, and designed in a wide variety ofdifferent configurations.

With respect to any or all of the message flow diagrams, scenarios, andflow charts in the figures and as discussed herein, each step, block,and/or communication can represent a processing of information and/or atransmission of information in accordance with example embodiments.Alternative embodiments are included within the scope of these exampleembodiments. In these alternative embodiments, for example, operationsdescribed as steps, blocks, transmissions, communications, requests,responses, and/or messages can be executed out of order from that shownor discussed, including substantially concurrently or in reverse order,depending on the functionality involved. Further, more or fewer blocksand/or operations can be used with any of the message flow diagrams,scenarios, and flow charts discussed herein, and these message flowdiagrams, scenarios, and flow charts can be combined with one another,in part or in whole.

A step or block that represents a processing of information cancorrespond to circuitry that can be configured to perform the specificlogical functions of a herein-described method or technique.Alternatively or additionally, a step or block that represents aprocessing of information can correspond to a module, a segment, or aportion of program code (including related data). The program code caninclude one or more instructions executable by a processor forimplementing specific logical operations or actions in the method ortechnique. The program code and/or related data can be stored on anytype of computer readable medium such as a storage device including RAM,a disk drive, a solid state drive, or another storage medium.

The computer readable medium can also include non-transitory computerreadable media such as computer readable media that store data for shortperiods of time like register memory and processor cache. The computerreadable media can further include non-transitory computer readablemedia that store program code and/or data for longer periods of time.Thus, the computer readable media may include secondary or persistentlong term storage, like ROM, optical or magnetic disks, solid statedrives, or compact-disc read only memory (CD-ROM), for example. Thecomputer readable media can also be any other volatile or non-volatilestorage systems. A computer readable medium can be considered a computerreadable storage medium, for example, or a tangible storage device.

Moreover, a step or block that represents one or more informationtransmissions can correspond to information transmissions betweensoftware and/or hardware modules in the same physical device. However,other information transmissions can be between software modules and/orhardware modules in different physical devices.

The particular arrangements shown in the figures should not be viewed aslimiting. It should be understood that other embodiments can includemore or less of each element shown in a given figure. Further, some ofthe illustrated elements can be combined or omitted. Yet further, anexample embodiment can include elements that are not illustrated in thefigures.

While various aspects and embodiments have been disclosed herein, otheraspects and embodiments will be apparent to those skilled in the art.The various aspects and embodiments disclosed herein are for purpose ofillustration and are not intended to be limiting, with the true scopebeing indicated by the following claims.

What is claimed is:
 1. A system comprising: a database containing afirst user profile that specifies a first preferred language of a firstuser and a second user profile that specifies a second preferredlanguage of a second user; and one or more processors configured to:receive, from the first user and within a chat session hosted by thesystem, a first set of messages in the first preferred language; causethe first set of messages to be translated into the second preferredlanguage; provide, to the second user and within the chat session, thefirst set of messages as translated into the second preferred language;receive, from the second user and within the chat session, a second setof messages in the second preferred language; cause the second set ofmessages to be translated into the first preferred language; provide, tothe first user and within the chat session on a first graphical userinterface, the second set of messages as translated into the firstpreferred language, wherein the first graphical user interface displaysa message that indicates that the content of the chat session has beentranslated by machine from the second preferred language to the firstpreferred language; provide, to the second user, a representation of thegraphical user interface; store, in persistent storage accessible to thesystem, a first transcript of the chat session in which the first set ofmessages and the second set of messages are in the first preferredlanguage; and store, in the persistent storage, a second transcript ofthe chat session in which the first set of messages and the second setof messages are in the second preferred language.
 2. The system of claim1, wherein the one or more processors are further configured to:receive, from the second user and within a private messaging facility ofthe chat session, a third set of messages; provide, to a third user andwithin the private messaging facility, the third set of messages;receive, from the third user and within the private messaging facility,a fourth set of messages; provide, to the second user and within theprivate messaging facility, the fourth set of messages; wherein thefirst transcript does not include the third set of messages and does notinclude the fourth set of messages; and wherein the second transcriptincludes the third set of messages and the fourth set of messages. 3.The system of claim 2, wherein the third set of messages and the fourthset of messages are in the second preferred language.
 4. The system ofclaim 1, wherein the chat session is also displayed, on a secondgraphical user interface to the second user, in the second preferredlanguage, and wherein the second graphical user interface contains afurther indication that the content of the chat session has beentranslated by machine from the first preferred language.
 5. The systemof claim 1, wherein the first user is an end-user or customer, andwherein the second user is a human agent.
 6. The system of claim 5,wherein an initial portion of the chat session was conducted between thefirst user and a virtual agent in the first preferred language, whereinthe chat session was handed off from the virtual agent to the humanagent, and wherein a graphical user interface displays, to the humanagent, a transcript of messages from the initial portion of the chatsession that are translated from the first preferred language to thesecond preferred language.
 7. The system of claim 1, wherein the chatsession is associated with a data record of an incident, issue, orproblem.
 8. The system of claim 7, wherein the data record is in thefirst preferred language, and wherein the one or more processors arefurther configured to: receive, from the first user and within the chatsession, a representation of the data record; cause the data record tobe translated into the second preferred language; and provide, to thesecond user and within the chat session, the data record as translatedinto the second preferred language.
 9. The system of claim 7, whereinthe data record is in the second preferred language, and wherein the oneor more processors are further configured to: receive, from the seconduser and within the chat session, a representation of the data record;cause the data record to be translated into the first preferredlanguage; and provide, to the first user and within the chat session,the data record as translated into the first preferred language.
 10. Thesystem of claim 1, wherein the one or more processors are furtherconfigured to: generate a graphical user interface representing aplurality of chat sessions in a list, wherein the chat session is in thelist, and wherein the graphical user interface indicates whether each ofthe plurality of chat sessions involved machine translation; andprovide, to the second user, a representation of the graphical userinterface.
 11. The system of claim 1, wherein causing the first set ofmessages and the second set of messages to be translated comprises:providing, to a translation model or service, the first set of messagesand the second set of messages with indicators of their respectiveoriginal languages and their respective target languages; and receiving,from the translation model or service, translations of the first set ofmessages and the second set of messages into their respective targetlanguages.
 12. The system of claim 1, wherein the system representslanguages with a first set of indicators and a translation model orservice used for translations represents languages with a second set ofindicators, and wherein the system includes a table that maps betweenthe first set of indicators and the second set of indicators forcorresponding languages.
 13. A computer-implemented method comprising:receiving, from a first user and within a chat session, a first set ofmessages in a first preferred language, wherein a database contains afirst user profile that specifies the first preferred language is of thefirst user and a second user profile that specifies a second preferredlanguage of a second user; causing the first set of messages to betranslated into the second preferred language; providing, to the seconduser and within the chat session, the first set of messages astranslated into the second preferred language; receiving, from thesecond user and within the chat session, a second set of messages in thesecond preferred language; causing the second set of messages to betranslated into the first preferred language; providing, to the firstuser and within the chat session on a first graphical user interface,the second set of messages as translated into the first preferredlanguage, wherein the first graphical user interface displays a messagethat indicates that content of the chat session has been translated bymachine from the second preferred language to the first preferredlanguage; storing, in persistent storage, a first transcript of the chatsession in which the first set of messages and the second set ofmessages are in the first preferred language; and storing, in thepersistent storage, a second transcript of the chat session in which thefirst set of messages and the second set of messages are in the secondpreferred language.
 14. The computer-implemented method of claim 13,further comprising: receiving, from the second user and within a privatemessaging facility of the chat session, a third set of messages;providing, to a third user and within the private messaging facility,the third set of messages; receiving, from the third user and within theprivate messaging facility, a fourth set of messages; providing, to thesecond user and within the private messaging facility, the fourth set ofmessages; wherein the first transcript does not include the third set ofmessages and does not include the fourth set of messages; and whereinthe second transcript includes the third set of messages and the fourthset of messages.
 15. The computer-implemented method of claim 13,wherein the chat session is also displayed, on a second graphical userinterface to the second user, in the second preferred language, andwherein the second graphical user interface contains a furtherindication that the content of the chat session has been translated bymachine from the first preferred language.
 16. The computer-implementedmethod of claim 13, wherein the first user is an end-user or customer,wherein the second user is a human agent, wherein an initial portion ofthe chat session was conducted between the first user and a virtualagent in the first preferred language, wherein the chat session washanded off from the virtual agent to the human agent, and wherein agraphical user interface displays, to the human agent, a transcript ofmessages from the initial portion of the chat session that aretranslated from the first preferred language to the second preferredlanguage.
 17. The computer-implemented method of claim 13, wherein thechat session is associated with a data record of an incident, issue, orproblem, and wherein the data record is in the first preferred language,the computer-implemented method further comprising: receiving, from thefirst user and within the chat session, a representation of the datarecord; causing the data record to be translated into the secondpreferred language; and providing, to the second user and within thechat session, the data record as translated into the second preferredlanguage.
 18. An article of manufacture including a non-transitorycomputer-readable medium, having stored thereon program instructionsthat, upon execution by a computing system, cause the computing systemto perform operations comprising: receiving, from a first user andwithin a chat session, a first set of messages in a first preferredlanguage, wherein a database contains a first user profile thatspecifies the first preferred language is of the first user and a seconduser profile that specifies a second preferred language of a seconduser; causing the first set of messages to be translated into the secondpreferred language; providing, to the second user and within the chatsession, the first set of messages as translated into the secondpreferred language; receiving, from the second user and within the chatsession, a second set of messages in the second preferred language;causing the second set of messages to be translated into the firstpreferred language; providing, to the first user and within the chatsession on a first graphical user interface, the second set of messagesas translated into the first preferred language, wherein the firstgraphical user interface displays a message that indicates that contentof the chat session has been translated by machine from the secondpreferred language to the first preferred language; storing, inpersistent storage, a first transcript of the chat session in which thefirst set of messages and the second set of messages are in the firstpreferred language; and storing, in the persistent storage, a secondtranscript of the chat session in which the first set of messages andthe second set of messages are in the second preferred language.